


Once Upon A Soulmate

by pherryt



Series: Star Trek Bingo [19]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Hope, Light Angst, Soulmates, different types of soulmates, post beyond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2019-06-22
Packaged: 2020-05-16 16:31:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19321921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pherryt/pseuds/pherryt
Summary: Once upon a time, Leonard H. McCoy had believed in happily ever after.Once upon a time, he’d believed in soulmates too.





	Once Upon A Soulmate

**Author's Note:**

> Officially, I have 8 days to finish 6 squares. i started one and i hate it, and i have no idea what to do with the free square. guys, i don't think i'm gonna finish my card! :( *sniffs*
> 
> if i do, it'll be a freaking miracle...

Once upon a time, Leonard H. McCoy had believed in happily ever after.

Once upon a time, he’d believed in soulmates too.

In fact, he’d _dreamed_ of it, of having the kind of love he saw between his parents, between his grandparents. It was an inspiring and uplifting thing and as a child, he couldn’t _wait_ to have that kind of bond with someone truly special.

Because of course he would, wouldn’t he? He saw the evidence around him as he grew up. The older he got, the more jaded he got, but he was still hopeful, still eager, still a romantic, possibly even a hopeless one. Maybe it didn’t work out for everyone, but it would work out for him, wouldn’t it? Because he wanted it so bad? Because he had so much love and care to give?

It was why he’d become a doctor, after all.

So yeah, despite growing evidence to the contrary – Leonard wasn’t fucking blind, after all – he couldn’t keep himself from believing that someday he’d find that special person, his soulmate, and have the happy ending he worked for.

And he’d thought he found her, thought they were happy together, thought that they would start their own family like some sort of fairy tale, and every day would be a brilliant gift of happy smiles and shared laughter, of childish giggles and a good day’s work well done.

But In the end, he’d been proved wrong, hadn’t he?

They’d married, things had been on track and then they fell on some hard times and divorce had followed and he’d been kicked off the fucking planet. So much for in sickness and in health, till death do us part. So much for vows from the heart that Leonard had thought would tie them together indefinitely.

It’d only taken his father’s death to tear them apart and break his damn heart.

He hated her for it, for a long damn time. Soulmates shouldn’t give up on each other like that. He’d have never given up on her.

What he hadn’t realized was, he’d given up on himself.

In retrospect, Leonard would admit after a lot of soul searching and many years had passed, that he hadn’t made it easy on her. That the events around his father’s death had broken him in ways most people wouldn’t be able to cope with.

The more he thought about it, the less he hated her, the less he blamed her…

The less he believed in soulmates and happily ever afters.

He ran away to Starfleet, because he was drunk and hopeless and as much as his ex-wife wanted him off the planet, Leonard just wanted to be _gone_ , with no more reminders of his multiple failures.

He never expected to find a life afterwards. Or a new family.

Yet somehow, that’s exactly what he did.

It took a lot of pestering from Jim, initially, to get him out of his self-imposed exile, to get him to be sociable again, but Jim never gave up on Leonard.

So Leonard never gave up on Jim, even when he was being an ass.

And through Jim, Leonard formed a family, a new one. Bonds forged in star fire and tears and pain, healed with laughter and hugs and just pure stubbornness. None of them seemed to mind his sarcastic pessimism, always seeing him for the true softy he didn’t like to admit he still was.

None of them gave up on him, either, coaxing him back whenever life threw him another curveball, though it was Jim and – surprisingly – Spock that had his back most often.

It was the two of them that spun Leonard around the most, kept him both off-balance and held together, however the hell they managed that.

It was during the incident with Khan, when Jim had (briefly) died, that Leonard had realized that maybe, _just maybe_ , he still believed in soulmates.

It was later, when the Enterprise was destroyed, the crew separated and Spock injured, that Leonard realized that if Spock died, or if he left the enterprise, his life would dim. Leonard told Spock he didn’t know what Jim would do with out him, but he really meant Jim _and_ Leonard.

What he felt for Spock was different than what he felt for Jim, but neither was it any less profound.

It shook Leonard to his core.

He looked around him, at the remaining crew affirming their relationships with each other, his eyes drawn naturally to both Jim and Spock, and realized something he’d never quite thought of before.

What if the world was filled with different _kinds_ of Soulmates? What if he’d never _really_ stopped believing, but had stopped _hoping_? Or maybe it was that he’d decided that he didn’t _deserve_ a soulmate anymore.

What if the wreckage of his marriage had been self-sabotage, a punishment on his father’s behalf?

What if he was still a hopeless romantic underneath it all?

Jim and Spock appeared at his side, Jim’s bruised face grinning wide at Leonard, while Spock gazed after Uhura, their shoulders brushing as they stood close, soaking in each other for comfort.

Comfort and reassurance that they were all still alive, still there, despite everything that had happened.

“Do either of you believe in Soulmates?” Leonard blurted, then turned red, trying to hide it by taking a sip of his drink.

Jim blinked and turned thoughtful. “I never really thought of it, but the way my mother goes on…” he trailed off and shook his head. “His death caused her so much pain… if soulmates exist, I think _they_ were. She never got over him.”

Leonard hummed. That… made sense actually. And since Jim had answered, he couldn’t help but look at Spock curiously.

“I bet there’s nothing like a soulmate in Vulcan culture. It’s got to be the most illogical thing there is,” Leonard couldn’t help but say.

“On the contrary, Doctor,” Spock said evenly, his eyes briefly flicking away from Nyota to give Leonard his earnest attention, “Vulcans do, indeed, believe in soulmates. Perhaps not the human definition of it, but we do believe.”

“How so?” Leonard asked suspiciously, narrowing his eyes.

“We are of the belief that certain people seem to… resonate with each other in a way that they don’t with anyone else, with connections easily forging between them, and that there are infinite combinations of people and connections: Familial, lovers, friends, colleagues.” He raised an eyebrow. “We do not subscribe to the idea of only one soulmate to each individual, nor do we attribute the bond with the idea that it is always of romantic entanglement. In fact, I have felt it no less than five times in my life - a bond unshakeable, with depths untold – three of which have occurred in recent years through my service in Starfleet, all of whom who serve directly with me.”

His head cocked, turned and stared back at Nyota who looked away quickly. Leonard and Jim traded smirking glances as Spock excused himself to join her.

Jim knocked Leonard’s shoulder. “Why the sudden interest?” he asked.

“Not sure. Just… thinking,” Leonard said. “Wondering if a soulmate is something, _someone_ , I can hold on to. It was something I thought gone, something I feared I didn’t deserve.”

Snorting, Jim tossed back the remainder of his drink, blindly placing it on a nearby table before draping a careless arm around Leonard shoulders and leaning close. “Bones, don’t be so hard on yourself. Look, I’m not saying I ascribe to the notion of soulmates –“

Except that only two minutes before, he’d been saying he did, Leonard thought with narrowed eyes, wondering what Jim was hiding –

“- but if anyone deserves one, it’s you. Whether or not the universe sees fit to allow you and your soulmate to meet,” he shrugged, “That’s another story.”

The two of them watched Spock stop beside Uhura, saw her smother a smile before she turned to face him, her face sober and calm.

“I think… I think the universe already has,” Leonard said. “If the Vulcan way of thinking is correct, and I find I like this concept Spock presented us, pretty as a picture, then I most definitely have. Whether one of them is more than platonic, well, only time will tell. But friends? Family? Definitely.”

“Good,” Jim said gruffly. He spun about, smiling at Leonard brightly, giving his shoulder a light punch. “Now c’mon, it’s a party, let’s get a little drunk. I hear tell Scotty scrounged up something fairly special that’ll knock our socks off. Imported from the edges of the known galaxy.”

Leonard followed after bemusedly, remarking, as dryly as he could, “Jim, we _explore_ those edges and push them back every day. Which edge is he even talking about? The one from today? Yesterday? Last week?”

Jim merely smirked and grabbed Leonard’s hand, dragging him off into the crowd of family he’d found among the Enterprise crew. Some of them were a bit closer than others, like Jim and Spock, Chapel and the bridge crew, Scotty and even Keenser. Some of them were more like the distant cousins you saw at a family reunion. You recognized their faces, knew they were part of you, but maybe you didn’t say much more than hi to on a regular basis.

But they were still family.

And, if Spock was to believed (and Leonard had decided he _wanted_ to believe again) some of them were his soulmates.

He grinned as he followed Jim through the crowd, drawn after him like the wake of a ship.

Leonard, it turned out, was still hopeless, after all, but letting the good cheer wash over him, he found was okay with that.

 


End file.
